The Diet Coke and Mentos reaction is a fun demonstration in chemistry and physics classes of many important concepts in thermodynamics, fluid dynamics, surface science, and the physics of explosions. The reaction has been performed numerous times on television and the Internet, but has not been systematically studied. We report on an experimental study of the Diet Coke and Mentos reaction, and consider many aspects of the reaction, including the ingredients in the candy and soda, the roughness of the candy, the temperature of the soda, and the duration of the reaction.

1.
Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman, “
Episode 57: Mentos and Soda
,” Mythbusters, Discovery Channel, first aired August 9,
2006
.
2.
Steve Spangler, “
Mentos geyser-Diet Coke eruption
,” www.stevespanglerscience.com/experiment/00000109.
3.
Jack F.
Eichler
,
Heather
Patrick
,
Brenda
Harmon
, and
Janet
Coonce
, “
Mentos and the scientific method: A sweet combination
,”
J. Chem. Educ.
84
,
1120
1123
(
2007
).
4.
We used a FEI Quanta 200 electron scanning microscope.
5.
Pablo G.
Debenedetti
,
Metastable Liquids: Concepts and Principles
(
Princeton University Press
, Princeton, NJ,
1996
), p.
218
.
6.
Daniel V.
Schroeder
,
An Introduction to Thermal Physics
(
Addison–Wesley Longman
, San Francisco, CA,
2000
), p.
216
.
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